WCC men’s basketball: Cougars knock Gaels out of first place

Chase Fischer scored 19 points, Kyle Collinsworth added 17, and BYU knocked St. Mary’s out of first place in the West Coast Conference with a 70-59 victory on Thursday night in Provo, Utah.

With the loss, St. Mary’s falls a half-game back of Gonzaga.

BYU remains in third place in the conference. Collinsworth had nine rebounds and seven assists.

St. Mary’s led 37-33 at the half, but BYU opened a nine-point lead after a 13-2 run – punctuated by Fischer’s 3-pointer – early in the second half.

BYU led by 13 points with 5:26 remaining, but Joe Rahon’s 3-pointer trimmed St. Mary’s deficit to six with 3:32 to go. The Gaels didn’t score again, missing their last eight shots.

San Diego 54, Pacific 43: Vasa Pusica made all eight of his shots from the field, was 3 for 3 on free throws and scored 19 points to lead the Toreros past the Tigers in San Diego.

Eric Thompson gave Pacific its first lead of the game at 32-30 with 15:27 left. Pusica hit a 3 before Alec Kobre responded to put the Tigers back up by two. But Pacific only shot 3 for 12 the rest of the way and turned the ball over 11 times. The Tigers finished with 23 turnovers.

Kobre led Pacific with 11 points and Ray Bowles and T.J. Wallace each scored nine.